Australian Army Sergeant Brett Wood, 32, of Ferntree Gully, Victoria, assigned to the 2nd Commando Regiment, based in Sydney, New South Wales, died on May 23, 2011, in Helmand province, Afghanistan, after insurgents attacked him with an improvised explosive device. He is survived by his wife Elvi, his mother Allison, and his father David. Donations can be made in his name to the Commando Welfare Trust.

Monday, March 26, 2012

Strength
We have finished our second Cycle of Wendler! Now what? On to cycle three! For squat and dead lift, your new projected 1-rep max is 10# heavier than it was at the beginning of the cycle. For press, an added 5 lbs. So you need to re-calculate your "Wendler #" (90% of your new projected 1RM for this second cycle of number). That's how you will progress!

Cycle 3, week 1:
Deadlift 5-5-5+ @ 65, 75, 85%

Metcon
From CrossFit Football

5 rounds of:
* 3 Power Snatches
* 3 Snatch Pulls(If this is a light weight for you, this will be a snatch HIGH PULL, and your elbows will be bent at the end of the movement. If this is heavy for you, then your elbows won't get quite so high. The goal, however, is to pull the $hit out of the bar and get it as high as you can. Comprendo?)
* 3 Power Snatches
(105/75#)2 minutes of rest between sets!

*Stay connected to the bar on each round. Do not drop the weight. No resting with your hands on the bar and the bar on the ground between reps people.
*If weight is dropped, count number of drops and immediately perform an equal amount of burpees as a penalty.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

How many of you are dealing with some form of chronic physical pain (everyone nods in agreement...)? How many of you have heard the term, 'mind over matter?' Did you know that there is a lot more science behind that statement than you may think? Your mind is an amazing thing. It allows your body to function in space, grind through all of those tough workouts that come up on the white board. Aside from motor control, though, your mind is what allows you to perceive the world, and make judgements about what's going on around you and within you.

Chronic pain related to some kind of tissue damage, well, it sucks. However, our perception of that pain can dramatically impact how we cope with the issue, and what activities we decide to do or to avoid because of our pain. You can't change permanent tissue damage, sorry folks. But you CAN change your perception of the pain you are experiencing. No this is not some kind of hoaxy meditation ploy. I'm not asking you to visualize the light in your body. This is about science, about the factors that modulate nociceptive pain processing. Don't underestimate the power of your mind. If you can change the way you perceive something, you might just find that you are better able to manage your pain.

If this is a topic that interests you, check out this article from Elsevier.

In other news, please welcome our new foundations grads to the gym if you see them in the regular WOD classes. Jason and Cindy are pictured below, Dos is the really tall guy in the group photo ;-) They all did a great job during foundations and we are happy to welcome them to our community!

This is the last workout in the Open competition for 2012. Lay it out there for this final workout, don't leave anything in the tank. If you haven't started to reflect on this experience already, I encourage you to after the conclusion of this final workout. Competition is an amazing thing. It pushes us to work past our mental limits. In a competition, there is no room for, 'I can't.' It's do or die. I bet a lot of you found the 'do' during some of these workouts--accomplishing things you didn't know you could. I've got a sneaking suspicion that a lot of us also found the 'die' during some of these workouts--falling short and not being able to get a muscle up, not being able to snatch 100 or 165 lbs. Competition is a beautiful thing because it gives us the opportunity to step back and evaluate. Right after a workout, if there is something about our performance that disappointment us, we usually start by judging ourselves:

"I can't do (insert weakness, example: muscle ups)... I am a terrible athlete, life's not worth living, I should flog myself and quit."

We all judge ourselves, I get it. Most of us are our own worst critics. But as this competition comes to a close I encourage you to move beyond your judgements and do some constructive reflection. What were you weak at in this competition, and what are you going to do about it? Every failure is an opportunity for growth, if we handle it appropriately. Competition is such a cool thing because it forces us to evaluate what we suck at. In a regular WOD class, it's too easy to blow past a weakness and pray that it won't come up again soon. In a competition, you have to put it all of the line where everyone can see. And if you fall short, it's not a secret. I want to congratulations all of the athletes in the gym who opened themselves up to this competition through their sucesses and their failures. You are all better athletes because of it. Now do some soul searching and make a plan to punish your weaknesses!

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Skill
Turkish Get ups
After warming up, do 5x1 on each side. Increase the weight for every attempt. When you get to your 5th attempt, it should be close to the maximum amount of weight you can do for a TGU.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

The following is an excerpt from the book SPARK by John J. Ratey, MD. It's an excellent resource on the topic of "the revolutionary new science of exercise and the brain."

Today, ... there's no need to forage and hunt to survive. Yet our genes are coded for this activity, and our brains are meant to direct it. Take that activity away, and you're disrupting a delicate biological balance that has been fine-tuned over half a million years. Quite simply, we need to engage our endurance metabolism to keep our bodies and brains in optimum condition. The ancient rhythms of activity ingrained in our DNA translate roughly to walking, jogging, running, and sprinting. In broad strokes, then, I think the best advice is to follow our ancestors' routine: walk or jog every day, run a couple of times a week, and then go for the kill every now and then by sprinting.

The author goes on to say that "your choices are not limited to this mode" meaning solely running. I think the important take home message here is that you need to engage all three metabolic pathways. (sound familiar?)
Also, Ratey goes on to cite studies and research that bears out what we as CrossFitters already know.

You have to continually challenge yourself to benefit optimally from exercise

Movements that are complex and demand coordination and motor skill are vital

Exercising with other people provides a social component that accelerates progress

Intensity of effort is directly correlated with a favorable outcome

Constant changing variety of movements and modes produces the best overall result

Sounds like the science is catching up to the reality that CrossFit is the best conditioning program available, and the one that best matches what are genes are coded for. Much of the material in this book directly supports the methods of CrossFit. Very refreshing. In addition, it's full of fascinating science. Remarkable breakthroughs in science show dramatic changes in your brain chemistry as a result of exercise. Quite simply, you need to get addicted to exercise. Movement and thinking are one. Exercise is like Miracle-Gro for your brain. You can't have optimal cognitive function, balanced mental and emotional health without movement. It's literally in your DNA.

Congrats to those who saw the entire two month Paleo challenge through to the end. The winners are as follows:

1st Prize: Joe W.

Joe had a score of 5 (lowest score wins). In addition to shedding body fat and improving his body composition, Joe improved his FGB score by 39 reps, and his CrossFit total by 90 lbs. Awesome dedication in regularly attending the 6AM class and putting in the hard work required to see this challenge through. Here's what he earned:

Kendell rounded this challenge out with a score of 8. Kendell shed an impressive 15 lbs over the last two months, and lost several % body fat. He also improved his CrossFit total. His FGB score didn't improve the second time around, but he has also been competing in the CrossFit Opens. Kendell is another regular at the 6AM class. It's no mistake that Kendell and Joe have been pushing each other in during the WODs and that they both came out on top of this challenge! Great Work Kendell.

Lee came in third place with a score of 9 points. Lee didn't have as dramatic of a physical transformation as some of our competitors, but his improvement skyrocketed with a whopping 48 rep increase on his FGB score. Great job Lee!

Cash Prize: $100

15% Off Group Foundations for a friend

SeaCity tee-shirt ($20 Value)

Honorable Mentions:

Anna came in 4th place, just one point behind Lee. She has been pushing herself past her limits during the open competitions and deserves a round of applause for her commitment and improvement. Roxanne lost 20 lbs over the last two months! Unfortunately, she had an injury at the beginning of the challenge that prohibited her from competing in FGB and the CrossFit total. Despite the adversity of injury, she has come back stronger than ever and continues to put in terrific effort at the gym.

Friday, March 9, 2012

A reminder to all those who participated in the Paleo Challenge: This Saturday at noon we will announce the challenge winners at our final paleo potluck. If you participated in the challenge, bring a dish and come see who put in the hard work to win!

Strength:

Wendler Cycle 2, week 2:

Squat 3-3-3+ @ 70, 80, 90%

‘Crushing Helen’ from CrossFit Football

8RFT *100 yard sprint

*8 KB swings (2pood/1pood)

*5 plyo push ups(These are no joke. If you can't do these, don't pretend... scale it down to clapping push ups, or regular push ups. No one looks cool flailing around on a med ball/slam ball, got it?)

Thursday, March 8, 2012

A reminder to all those who participated in the Paleo Challenge: This Saturday at noon we will announce the challenge winners at our final paleo potluck. If you participated in the challenge, bring a dish and come see who put in the hard work to win!

Partner WOD!

Only one partner can work at a time, you must complete all the reps of an exercise before moving on to the next. Partition reps as desired (ex. Alternate doing 10 reps at a time until you finish each exercise). In teams of two, complete the following:

* 100 Box jumps (24/20”)

* 80 Dumbell push press (40/30#)

* 60 sit ups

* 40 Burpees

* 20 Strict pull ups

* 10 Jumping lunges

Games WOD 12.3(7PM CLASS ONLY)
As many rounds and reps as possible in 18 minutes of:

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

When I first started tinkering around with CrossFit workouts around 2005-2006 in my garage, President George W. Bush had just been elected to a second term. The social network of choice was Myspace. This is what most cell phones looked like. Miley Cyrus was still an innocent Hannah Montana. In fact, while I was getting acquainted with "Fran" out back of my house, many of the people currently opening CrossFit boxes and drinking the kool-aid were square in the middle of puberty. There were zero CF gyms in Corpus Christi, and only a handful across Texas. To give some perspective, my friend Grace Patenaude opened Atomic CrossFit in Houston in June 2008. She was the 4th to open in Houston and surrounding areas. As of Oct 2013, there were 136 CrossFit gyms in the Greater Houston area.

So you could say I've been doing CrossFit a lot longer than most. I've seen a lot of things change over that time. There's been an explosion of popularity. It's been very interesting to watch it go from a completely unheard-of underground movement, to mainstream. It puts me in a unique position, having seen the early days, and then the transformation.

There are now gyms everywhere. Some might say there are too many, but that remains to be seen. Here's one way to think of it. You can go to a McDonald's restaurant in any town, and you know the Big Mac is gonna taste exactly the same. The menu will be the same. In fact every aspect of the operation is tightly controlled, down to the temperature they cook the fries. (God forbid you're actually eating this stuff!) A McDonald's owner is not free to do as they please. There is a template in place with specific procedures. They don't innovate.

CrossFit is not like McDonald's. It's NOT a franchise. All that is technically needed to open a CrossFit affiliate is money or a line of credit. And while more of it makes your gym appear nice with shiny new equipment, you can't buy competence, and you can't fake passion. There is no corporate control, no directives from above on what to do or how to do it. No one tells you what exercises to include in workouts, how to arrange the gym or how to run your business. You can do just about anything you want to do, whether it's absolutely dead wrong, or whether it's a stroke of genius. Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of support available from other affiliates who run quality operations, there's a great community of people, lots of resources provided by HQ to help new people get pointed in the right direction. BUT ultimately you as the owner of your box are perfectly free to louse it up and and hurt people, create poor programming, overcharge people, make dishonest claims, be careless, complacent, lazy, deliver sub-par coaching etc...etc...

Personally I love the freedom to run my business as I see fit. It's one of the things I love most about being a CF box owner. I don't like being told what to do. But there's a catch. In a free market, the consumer has a serious responsibility. The system can only work as it should if people punish mediocrity by not supporting it. That's where you come in.

You the consumer must vote with your feet and not go to a sub-par gym. You need to recognize the mediocrity. The free market should naturally eliminate the incompentent and the weak. In an ideal world that's how it's supposed to go down.

Unfortunately I don't think it always does.Until a person has been exposed to a quality gym, good coaching, best practices, and passionate individuals who embody the spirit of CrossFit, they may just not know better. Sometimes people need to see the really good before they can identify what bad is. Even then, I think people often put up with incompetence simply because it's easier, their friends train there and because change takes courage. That's a shame.

As CrossFit continues to burgeon in popularity, the consumer must be vigilant and do their own research. Don't be lazy and misinformed, or you could be the victim of poor coaching or bad programming. At best you will not make very good progress, and at worst you could get hurt. You should question everything. Don't make the mistake of just choosing the box that's closest to you out of convenience. It may be great, and it may not. Maybe that slightly longer drive to another affiliate could be so radically worth it that you'd kick yourself for not doing it sooner. Look around, ask questions, it's an important decision. If you really intend to give this CrossFit thing a go, do it right. Don't settle. Don't just go to the one your facebook friends told you about. Don't confuse excitement with passion. Don't underestimate the importance of the decision. This choice can profoundly impact your life, potentially as much or more than any other decision you make. Be thorough!

Monday, March 5, 2012

You have 1 hour to establish your 1RM Squat, Deadlift, and Press. Warm up efficiently and take 3 or less attempts at each lift.

WORDS OF WISDOM
The CrossFit total is a great way to establish your max effort lifts so that you can continue to make progress using strength building programs like the Wendler 5/3/1 program that we are using right now. HOWEVER. It is far better to undershoot your max lift by 5-15 pounds than it is to injure yourself. Proper technique is absolutely paramount. I can't stress this enough. If you can squat 400 lbs but your knees collapse in, you strain your meniscus, and you can't train for a month... that's not much of an accomplishment. YOUR ONE REP MAX IS THE MOST WEIGHT YOU CAN SQUAT/PRESS/DEADLIFT WITH PERFECT TECHNIQUE. Your one rep max is NOT how much weight you can manage to lift while sacrificing your body. Having a lot of heart and determination to do something is admirable, we want you to push yourself to the limit! Just make sure you know what your limits are so you can work right up to their edge and progress, rather than going past them and becoming injured. Now go pick up some heavy $hit!

Here's Coach Rippetoe's philosophy on how to approach the lifts. This is good advice from one of the best powerlifting coaches in the world.

The first attempt would be a weight you know you can do for a heavy set of three. The second attempt would be a weight you know without any doubt that you could do for a single, having just done the first attempt. And the third attempt is the weight you want to do, based on your performance on the previous two attempts.

Sunday, March 4, 2012

Friday, March 2, 2012

** Tomorrow (Saturday) we will be re-testing FIGHT GONE BAD at 10AM (no regular WOD class). We will also be having a farewell (paleo) potluck immediately following FGB II for Joy, she's headed off to the east coast! If you plan to stay for the potluck, please bring a dish with you.***

Thursday, March 1, 2012

** Upcoming events reminder to all those participating in the Paleo Challenge: This coming Saturday we will be re-testing FIGHT GONE BAD at 10AM. We will also be taking 'after' photos and re-measuring body composition. If you are also competing in the CrossFit OPENS, consider doing workout 12.2 on Thursday and resting Friday so you are ready for Fight Gone Bad on Saturday. We will also be having a farewell (paleo) potluck immediately following FGB II for Joy, she's headed off to the east coast! If you plan to stay for the potluck, please bring a dish with you.***

SkillI. Ring dips 5-10reps x 5 sets. How do you feel about ring dips? Proceed accordingly:
a) Ring dips are a joke, I eat them for breakfast: do 5x10 reps, take little rest between sets.
b) Ring dips kinda suck, but I can do a few at a time: do 5-8 reps with a little more rest.
c) Ring dips, you kuh-razy: Do assisted ring dips with a band.
d) Ring & dip aren't two words I speak in the same sentence: Practice your stability on the rings by holding yourself, arms locked out, on the rings. Do 5 sets of 15-30sec holds.

II. Handstand holds 5x (30 seconds on : 30 seconds off). If you can't do a handstand hold, you will scale using a box. You can scale like the picture below, on your toes, or you can use the same set up but with your knees on the box.